Month: December 2013

We’re celebrating God’s faithfulness here on the True Woman blog with some of our favorite posts from 2013. We trust these posts will help you start your year off with a God-centered focus.

I pen these words a few days after a bomber took out an eight-year-old as he waited for his dad to cross the finish line of the Boston marathon. There’s not a single day I drop my son off at preschool that I don’t think about Sandy Hook and have to fight the urge to do a U-turn in the school parking lot, bring him home, and lock all the doors. Then there are super viruses, bacterial infections, and childhood cancers. It’s enough to make me want to say this desperate prayer all day, every day, “Jesus, keep my kids safe. Jesus, keep my kids safe. JESUS, PLEASE KEEP MY KIDS SAFE!”

Is it possible that God wants to call our children to something dangerous?

But our kids aren’t growing up in a safe world. In fact, no child ever has.

It’s natural to want our children to be protected from harm, but lately I’ve been thinking that when we spend all our energy praying for our children to be safe, we are missing something big. We are asking God to be our children’s safety net. Is it possible that instead He wants to call them to something dangerous?

This is how Jesus taught us to pray:

“And [Jesus] said to them,
‘When you pray, say: ‘Father, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread,
and forgive us our sins,
for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation.’” (Luke 11:2–4)

Jesus doesn’t teach us to avoid asking for needs to be met. “Daily bread” represents the essentials of life. Health and safety certainly qualify. But asking for those things wasn’t the essence of His prayer. His focus was on the Father’s will.

The Christian life is not a safe life. It is

a call to live counter-culturally and to willingly engage in battles that are big and costly.

The words “your kingdom come” slay me when I think about praying for my children. I spend so much of my time praying for my kingdom. I am supposed to be praying for His.

With God’s kingdom in mind, is safe the most important thing for my kids to be? When I look hard at the life God calls us to as Christians, the answer is clearly no. The Christian life is not a safe life. It is a call to live counter-culturally and to willingly engage in battles that are big and costly.

Ephesians 6:12 offers this perspective:

“We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

We want our children to follow Christ, but that likely won’t lead to an easy, safe life. It means they will need to pick up their cross. It means they will need to lay down their lives. It means they will become warriors in battles against the “spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” It means they won’t always be “safe.”  

I have a friend who has often prayed this prayer for me:

“Jesus, make Erin and her family dangerous to the Enemy.”

Dangerous? It’s the opposite of safe. But the truth is no matter how much we wish it wasn’t so, there is no guarantee of safety in this world. And while it may temporarily soothe our anxiety to beg the Lord to hide our kids from all threats of harm, there is a better prayer we can be praying:

“Lord, make my child dangerous to the Enemy.”

It’s a prayer that may not wrap us up in comfort like begging the Lord to keep our kids safe has a tendency to do. It is a bigger prayer with bigger implications than a safety net can ever offer. But decades from now, after I am long gone and my kids come to the end of their own lives, if I’m honest, I hope they won’t have played it safe. I hope they will have given everything they have to further God’s kingdom. I hope others will see they were a serious threat to those spiritual forces of evil. As their momma, prayer is a huge part of my job, so I’m resolved to pray for more than safety. Yes, I want them to be protected, but even more than that, I want them to be dangerous.

Will you join me in praying for God to make our kids a generation that is especially dangerous to the Enemy?

The book of 1 Samuel records a great battle between the people of God, the Israelites, and one of their fiercest enemies, the Philistines. Israel lost 4,000 men on the battlefield in a single day. In the face of such crushing defeat, the elders of Israel called for the Ark of the Covenant to be brought into the camp to rally the troops and boost morale.

First Samuel 4:5–7 reports, “As soon as the ark of the covenant of the LORD came into the camp, all Israel gave a mighty shout, so that the earth resounded. And when the Philistines heard the noise of the shouting they said, ‘What does this great shouting in the camp of the Hebrews mean?’ And when they learned that the ark of the LORD had come to the camp, the Philistines were afraid, for they said, ‘A god has come into the camp.’ And they said, ‘Woe to us! For nothing like this has happened before.'”

God is alive and well and involved in the lives of His people.

The Ark of the Covenant was a visible sign of the holy presence of God. God didn’t live in that box, of course, but it was a reminder God was alive and well and involved in the lives of His people.

Because of this, when the Ark came into the camp, the Bible tells us the people of God celebrated so loudly the earth shook.

Talk about a celebration!

But what caused much rejoicing among the people of God caused much fear among their enemies.

The Philistines said three things we need to pay attention to:

1. A god has come into the camp.
2. Woe to us!
3. Nothing like this has happened before.

Hold that thought. We’ll come back to it.

Fast-forward to the Christmas story recorded in the first few chapters of Matthew and Luke.

“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us) (Matt. 1:23).

Of course, this passage is talking about the birth of Jesus, but don’t miss one of the other names for Jesus—Immanuel. The prophets had foretold that people would refer to Him in this way all the way back in Isaiah 7:14:

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”

God wanted His people to know and to wait with expectation for the day He would dwell among them. Pause for a moment. Let your mind be blown.

• God among us.
• The God who created all things, among us.
• The God who knows all things, among us.
• The God who reigns. The God who rules. The God whose power knows no limits, among us.

Immanuel is a very big deal.

God left heaven and came to earth to be with us. To rescue us. But when He ascended into heaven, He did not leave us alone.

As we celebrate Christmas this year, we need to take a minute to hone in on Immanuel. God left heaven and came to earth to be with us. To rescue us. But when He ascended into heaven, He did not leave us alone.

In Matthew 28:20, Jesus said, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

No matter what, He remains “God with us.”

And if we’re telling the whole story, we see this radical reality still has the same effect on God’s enemies.

Remember what the Philistines said?

1. A god has come into the camp.
2. Woe to us!
3. Nothing like this has happened before.

You better believe God’s enemy, Satan, is still singing that tune this Christmas.

1. God is with them!
2. Woe to me! Translation: I’m ruined.
3. Nothing like this has ever happened before.

He came to be with us to save us from sin and death. He came to be with us because we so desperately need to be rescued.

You see, Christmas is about so much more than the Babe in the manger. He didn’t come to be with us so that we could look over the edge of His crib and ooh and ah. He came to be with us, to die for our sins . . . to rise from the grave . . . to deal a fatal blow to our shared enemy. He came to be with us to save us from sin and death. He came to be with us because we so desperately need to be rescued.

So celebrate that this Christmas. Celebrate so loudly that others notice. Take a cue from the people of Israel, and dance until the earth shakes. Because Immanuel changes everything.

“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us) (Matt. 1:23).

To examine other characters from the Christmas story, visits these posts by Erin Davis on LiesYoungWomenBelieve.com.

Sinking Your Teeth into the Promises of God

The Original Grinch

What Should We Do for Jesus?

A Closer Look at Mary’s Dream Guy

The Bravest Sentence in the Bible

‘Tis the season to be hospitable.

One thing I love about the Christmas season is we tend to look over the fences that so often separate us from those near by and say, “Come on in.” We host Christmas parties and dinners. We blow up the airbeds and set out the guest towels and invite family members from out of town to stay awhile. We bake. We clean. We decorate. We host.

All this is a very good thing! We tend to think of hospitality as a character trait reserved for those with natural Martha Stewart-like capabilities. But did you know the Bible urges all of us to demonstrate hospitality?

It’s true!

Romans 12:13 says, “Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.”

1 Peter 4:9 says, “Show hospitality to one another . . .” (But there’s a catch. We’ll get to that in a minute.)

When I make my home an inhospitable environment for the people I love most in order to make it welcoming for others, I’m missing God’s heart for hospitality.

What is hospitality exactly? I like to think of it as providing a soft place to land in a world that is often hard to take. There are lots of verses throughout the entire Bible that encourage us to practice hospitality; especially toward those who belong to what Galatians 6:10 calls “the household of faith” (i.e. other Christians).

But let’s get real. Those cookies don’t bake themselves. Guests make messes. They upset routines. They give us the overwhelming urge to dust the baseboards. Christmas parties and dinners take a lot of time, money, and effort on our parts. The Food Network makes it all look so easy, but often it isn’t.

I don’t know about you, but as I seek to be hospitable toward others, I tend to be inhospitable toward the members of my own family. I bark out orders to my husband and children. I sigh heavily under the false sense that no one but me is doing any of the work. I grumble about the money spent, the time invested, the floors that need swept (again!).

Remember 1 Peter 4:9? I told you there was a catch. The entire verse reads,

“Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.”

When I make my home an inhospitable environment (as in hostile, cold, and unwelcoming) for the people I love most in order to make it welcoming for others, I’m missing God’s heart for hospitality.

Yes! Invite people over to your home. Yes! Seek to provide warm meals and warm fuzzies. Yes! Create a soft spot for others to land. But do it without grumbling. Because a peaceful home flows out of a peaceful heart.

Colossians 3:23–24 is a great mantra for each of us to adopt this holiday season:

“Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.”

The goal of hospitality is not to win a prize for cleanest house, best meal, or coziest bed. The goal is to demonstrate Christ’s love in practical and tangible ways. Since He is the One we are ultimately serving, in order to demonstrate true hospitality, His priorities (people), must become our priorities.

Don’t work to earn gold stars and oohs and aahs this year. Work to put Christ on display.

So . . . seek to bless others during this busy season. Look for ways to show hospitality. But start with those closest to you. How can you demonstrate hospitality to your husband? Your children? Your co-workers?

And remember to give with a happy heart. A store-bought pie served with a smile is of much greater value than a homemade one made through gritted teeth. Don’t work to earn gold stars and oohs and aahs this year. Work to put Christ on display. What could be better than that?

I’d love to hear all about your holiday plans. Tell me how you’ll be showing hospitality toward others this year, and we’ll choose five of you on Thursday, December 12, to win Nancy’s message, “The Heart Of Hospitality” on CD.